The Learning Curve: Some Board Members Have No Intention to Search for New Supe

The past six days have been a whirlwind for San Diego Unified. The board abruptly fired Superintendent Lamont Jackson on Friday after an investigation substantiated allegations that he’d sexually harassed two former female employees. Then, they promoted Jackson’s second-in-command, Deputy Superintendent Fabiola Bagula to acting superintendent. 

As I reported on Tuesday, it seems like the board wants to keep Bagula there. If her position becomes permanent, Bagula, who worked at the district for years prior to leaving for the San Diego County Office of Education and eventually being hired back by Jackson, would be the district’s third homegrown superintendent in a row.  

Board member Richard Barrera said yesterday that while Bagula is currently acting superintendent, the board is poised to appoint her interim superintendent at its Sept. 10 meeting. 

“There’s every intention that [Bagula] is going to continue forward as the superintendent and there’s not an intention right now to do a search [for a new superintendent,]” Barrera said. 

A District Employee Perspective 

But while members of San Diego Unified’s board clearly have confidence in Bagula’s ability to do the job, not all district employees seem to feel the same. 

Yesterday, Bagula held a meeting with staff members to try to calm the waters, but one staff member who attended said they came away feeling the vibe was more turbulent. The employee, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of retribution, said the meeting began with Bagula crying while delivering the first sentence of her message.  

“She spoke of her sense of loss, while the executive team members surrounding her appeared visibly distraught. Out of respect for victims, or even potential victims, her message should have begun with a general statement about any type of harassment or abuse of power not being tolerated in the district by any member of the school community,” the employee wrote.  

The employee was also hoping for more detailed communication that empowered staff, outside distractions be damned. They didn’t feel they received that. 

“Instead, principals left the meeting feeling as if our district leaders are weak, can’t get past their personal relationships with [Jackson] and lack confidence in their ability to run the district,” they wrote. 

A District Parent Perspective 

Employees aren’t the only ones feeling burned. In a lengthy email sent to San Diego Unified’s board, Bernard Mauricia, a father of a fifth grader attending a district elementary school, excoriated officials’ response to the crisis.  

“My daughter is a 5th grader in your district, and like every parent, I entrust her education and well-being to you, believing that SD Unified would uphold the values of safety, integrity, and accountability. But the district’s recent actions, and inactions, have shattered that trust,” he wrote. 

Mauricia called not only the results of the investigation, but the board’s decision to fire Jackson without cause “nothing short of appalling.” The board’s firing of Jackson without cause ensured, per his contract, that he would receive pay for the next six months. All told, Jackson is set to receive about $216,562. Though board members I spoke to would not confirm it, the board likely chose that route to squash the possibility Jackson would sue.  

“How can you, in good conscience, justify continuing to pay a man who, as your own investigation confirms, engaged in behavior that is entirely antithetical to the values we expect our leaders to embody? How could the Board possibly reward this behavior (at a cost of $200,000+ no less)? Is this a standard practice amongst all employees of SDUSD, whether as part of a union or not?” Mauricia wrote. 

But it wasn’t just the board’s approach to Jackson’s firing that upset Mauricia. He connected the most recent revelations about San Diego Unified’s lead official with the results of a troubling report from the U.S. Department of Education that slammed the way the district for years handled allegations of sexual misconduct.  

For Mauricia, the swirl of factors demonstrated a “catastrophic failure of leadership.” Meanwhile, the federal investigation “made it clear that this is not a case of isolated incidents, but a systemic problem that has been allowed to grow unchecked due to a lack of accountability and a preference for maintaining the status quo.” 

When asked, two board members conceded that there are still problems within the district but would not concede that there’s a deeper cultural issue.  

“I can’t accept that assertion. I think there are a lot of specific circumstances, both in the situation that was documented in the [federal] report, and the Lamont investigation … There’s too much detail involved in each situation to accept this sort of connection between the two,” Barrera said.  

The two board members I spoke to argued that the district has made improvements since the period investigated by the U.S. Department of Education and that the board is committed to continuing to examine the policies in place to determine where there’s room for additional improvements. Words, however, seem unlikely to convince deeply concerned parents like Mauricia that all will be well.  

“Your handling of these matters — both past and present — displays a disturbing disconnect between the district’s actions and the values of transparency, accountability, and safety that you claim to uphold. This is not the behavior of a ‘family’ as your email suggests; this is the behavior of an organization that has lost its moral compass,” Mauricia wrote.  

Mauricia added three questions he’d like the board members to answer in a response to him: 

• “Why should our parents and taxpayers foot the bill for a superintendent who has been credibly accused of such serious misconduct? 
• What concrete steps are you taking to address the systemic issues highlighted by the Department of Education and this current debacle? 
• How will you ensure that no other child in this district suffers due to our leadership’s failures?” 

What We’re Writing 

• The first bachelor’s program offered by San Diego City College in its 110-year history last month welcomed its first students. It capped two tumultuous years of fighting to make it a reality. Now, the San Diego Community College District is setting its sights on a new bachelor’s degree at City College. There’s just one problem: under current state law, community colleges are barred from developing it. That may change soon, but mimicking past skirmishes, public four-year universities aren’t on board.